In this category, you can find articles relating to discrimination in the workplace. Every human has biases and discriminates. Biases are our brain’s way of making fast decisions, and biases and discrimination don’t just refer to our interactions with people. We are biased to prefer things that are closer in time and space for example, rather than things that are far away. What this translates into is that we typically prefer people who are physically closer to us, which usually means people that look like us, hold similar views to us, which is where discrimination occurs.
Even when we think we are making employment decisions based on objective criteria like merit and cultural fit, we are discriminating in employment against certain groups of people. Before you commence recruiting for your new team member, consider if are you using gender-inclusive language in your ads, de-identifying CVs before selection, having a balanced interview panel and using structured behavioural interview questions.
Discrimination does real damage to individuals. Using functional MRIs, researchers have found that being put down, subject to sexual harassment, general harassment and bullying, ridiculed, excluded, or socially isolated causes our brain to react the same way as if we are experiencing physical pain.
In this blog, we look at easy ways you can start to make your recruitment processes more inclusive. We look at managing difficult conversations, casual bigotry, discrimination legislation, prohibiting discrimination, unlawful discrimination, race and sex discrimination, discrimination on the basis of ethnic origin, all from the perspective of the employee or prospective employee.